AFGHANISTAN

Up to 16 Afghan security forces servicemen have been killed in a US airstrike in Afghanistan, according to local police spokesman Salam Afghan. Washington says the incident was a case of friendly fire.

“In the strike, 16 Afghan policemen were killed including two commanders. Two other policemen were wounded,” Salam Afghan told AFP.

At the beginning of the year The Intercept published a lengthy article straightforwardly titled “The Crimes of the SEAL Team 6.” The article tells little about the heroism or professionalism of the servicemen of the American special forces unit SEAL Team 6, which Hollywood and bestselling authors are so fond of. The Intercept took the courage to investigate the darker side of war – crimes that are being routinely committed by US servicemen. The investigation into SEAL Team 6 was conducted for two years and included 18 interviews with former and current soldiers and officers of the unit. The Intercept article is somewhat reminiscent of The New York Times piece on the same topic published back in 2015.

Webmaster's Commentary:

IF, in fact these charges are true, this is appalling.

And yet, 16 years on, the Taliban is still gaining territory in Afghanistan, as I posted earlier today.

The weekend once again saw the Taliban racking up territorial gains within Afghanistan, seizing the Taywara District in the Ghor Province, and also taking control of the Kohistan District in the far northern Faryab Province, forcing security forces in both districts to retreat and wait for reinforcements.

Taywara is the bigger fight, according to reports, with around 70 Afghan soldiers killed and 30 others wounded in the fighting. In Faryab, the attack was more of a surprise, with Taliban arriving under the cover of night and burning the police headquarters and other office buildings.

This is likely to be a recurring problem for the Afghan military, as the force is nowhere near as large as it is on paper. Many of the Afghan soldiers officials on the payroll are actually “ghost soldiers,” just names that are on the books so some higher ranking official can pocket their salary without any real soldier to complain that he didn’t get paid.

Webmaster's Commentary:

My, how "brilliantly" the US/NATO occupation of Afghanistan is going; the Taliban are gaining more of a foothold in the country, 16 years on, and the US/NATO Coalition is painfully impotent to stop this.

IF the US and NATO leadership had two brain cells to rub together, they would have to admit, after all the blood and money spent here, that there is utterly no military metric by which this insane war can be characterized as "having been won."

What they should do is to remove all Western troops as soon as safely possible, then negotiate with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for the Afghani pipeline and mineral rights; of course, that would be logical, but the collective governmental and military hubris of both sides of the Coalition won't let it happen.

The CIA recruited the Muslim Brotherhood to fight a proxy war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, which led to the withdrawal of the Soviets from the Hindu Kush. Since then, the CIA used the mercenaries to fight more proxy wars in the Balkans, Chechnya, and Azerbaijan. Due to the wars of aggression against Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen the US and its vassal states created sectarian violence that led to civil wars. Right now, the CIA and the Muslim Brotherhood are present in the form of ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

On April 13, the US dropped a non-atomic bomb in the Achin district of the Afghan province of Nangarhar, known as the “Mother of All Bombs” or MOAB. Following the incident the citizens who survived are showing signs of horrible diseases.

One of the employees of the Health Care Corps of the Achin district in an interview with Sputnik, on condition of anonymity, stated that after this incident, the residents of the district began to show skin and eye diseases.

According to him, the symptoms found in these civilians are very likely indicative of radiation exposure that could have been caused by the presence of uranium inside the dropped bomb.

The US Air Force has used the same number of munitions in the first half of 2017 as they used at the same point in 2012. At the same time, the number of missions has decreased and the number of civilian deaths has increased.

The civilian death toll in Afghanistan, some 16 years into the US-led invasion and occupation, continues to rise precipitously, with the most recent figures out of the United Nations showing 1,662 civilians killed in the first half of 2017, the highest civilian toll of the entire war.

Officials had expressed hope civilian deaths had more or less leveled off, when the first half of 2016, the previous record, gave way to a roughly identical figure in the second half. Increased airstrikes and some major suicide bombings drove another increase, however.

The civilian toll was particularly grave for women and children, with casualties among women up 23% and 9% among children. This was exemplified by an early February US airstrike in Sangn District, which killed 26 civilians.

Webmaster's Commentary:

These assassinations of primarily innocent victims, highlights that what the US and NATO have been doing for the last 16 years in Afghanistan has not worked.

One of the most classic definitions of insanity is doing the same thing, in precisely the same manner, yet expecting a different outcome.

That is precisely what has been happening in Afghanistan.

So President Trump, a word, please: get US and NATO forces out of Afghanistan as quickly as safely possible,then negotiate with whatever government is still standing in Kabul for the pipeline and mineral rights.

After all, you do know that it was President Bush's squabble with Afghanistan's Taliban leadership over costs on the pipeline rights which initially motivated President Bush to declare war on Afghanistan, and march US and NATO troops into the country, RIGHT?!?

The Pentagon's top leader says officials are still mulling the proper strategy in Afghanistan to avoid rash decisions that could hurt the United States and its allies in the long run.

"Welcome to strategy," Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Friday. He had stopped in to speak with Pentagon reporters before a meeting with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to further discuss options in Syria.

Mattis said he's listening to all options and wrapping everything "under a regional context."

"This is hard, and there's a reason we got into some wars in our nation's history and didn't know how to end them. This is hard work and, if anyone else says otherwise, [he] is either somebody who didn't have to deal with it or deal with the consequences of the decisions of it," he said.

Webmaster's Commentary:

Sec-Def Mattis, a word please; continuing to throw more troops at Afghanistan has not worked for the last 16 years. And as a military person, you appreciate the notion that doing something precisely the same way, over and over, yet expecting a different outcome, is a classic definition of insanity.

And sir, I do have a suggestion here; evacuate US and NATO troops as quickly as safely as possible, then negotiate with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for the pipeline and mineral rights in the country.

I understand that you do know that it was the reality that that pipeline rights price the Taliban set was viewed by President Bush as "too high", and that...is the real reason the US military went into Afghanistan in the first place, right?!?

Private military contractors have spotted an opportunity as America’s longest war grinds on. Here’s a crazy idea floating around Washington these days, outlandish even by today’s outlandish standards: The United States should hire a mercenary army to “fix” Afghanistan, a country where we’ve been at war since 2001, spending billions along the way. The big idea here is that they could extricate U.S. soldiers from this quagmire, and somehow solve it

The end of May marked the death of a man who had been at the center of global affairs for decades. Zbigniew Brzezinski, born in Warsaw in the 1920s, was one of the most influential foreign policy advisers in the US, who also played a pivotal role in the drive towards further global integration.

Earlier this week, The New York Times published a story on how top Trump administration officials have asked Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater, and billionaire Stephen Feinberg, who owns military contractor DynCorp, to come up with alternative plans on how to proceed in Afghanistan.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the two men, who have made untold sums of money off the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, came up with a plan to rely on private contractors instead of the US military. This story may sound familiar and it usually doesn’t end well.

Last month — after The Wall Street Journal fired Jay Solomon, its chief foreign affairs correspondent, for failure to disclose shady business deals with one of his sources — we published a book excerpt that revealed some juicy details about that source, Farhad Azima, and his unsavory colleagues.

Webmaster's Commentary:

There is only one intelligent answer to that belching cesspool which is Afghanistan, 16 years on: have NATO and US troops leave as quickly as is safe, then negotiate with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for rights to the oil pipelines (which is why Bush sent our troops there n the first place); the mineral rights, and rights to the opium, which funds "off the shelf" operations over which Congress has utterly no oversight.

And, BTW, here are some images of American troops guarding those opium poppy fields in Afghanistan:

An SAS soldier has sensationally lifted the lid on the elite regiment’s controversial shoot-to-kill policy in Afghanistan – the subject of a multi-million pound investigation by military police.

In the first media interview with any SAS member to take part in operations included in the war crimes probe, the former trooper admitted to The Mail on Sunday that illegal killings were ‘an unwritten rule of our job’ but strongly defended the regiment’s actions.

His gripping account of top-secret night operations in Afghanistan comes after claims emerged that SAS members had killed unarmed civilians in cold blood and falsified mission reports.

Since President Trump handed off the decision on the Afghan War’s escalation to Defense Secretary James Marris, we’ve heard several wildly different figures from different sources, with some reports suggesting that an escalation of 3,000 to 5,000 was too small, and that Mattis might ultimately go much, much bigger.

In reality, however, officials now say that Mattis’ autonomy on the matter has its limits, and those limits are 3,900 more US ground troops. A classified memo is said to be in place which would oblige Mattis to get White House authorization if his escalation is to be any larger than that.

The Pentagon has declined to comment on the matter, noting the memo is classified, but some administration officials are said to have been surprise that any restrictions at all were placed on Mattis for deciding on troop levels in Afghanistan.

Webmaster's Commentary:

One of the classic definitions of insanity is doing precisely the same thing, in exactly the same manner, yet expecting a different outcome; this is what is happening in the US/NATO occupation of Afghanistan.

There is utterly zero military metric by which the occupation, now in its 16th year, can be judged "a success". We have had military surges and drawdowns, but that has not affected the reality on the ground that the Taliban control even more territory than they have before.

And I have to wonder if President Trump has given Mattis "limited authority" on the troop strength in Afghanistan to be able to blame him when the coming "surge" winds up having absolutely zero effect on the situation on the ground here. Because were I a betting person, I would almost be willing to bet that the coming surge will not be enough to really make a difference.

What should the US and NATO do in Afghanistan, then?!? Were I President Trump and the NATO Commander-General Stoltenberg, I would have troops exit Afghanistan as quickly as safely possible, then negotiate with whatever government was left in Kabul for the pipeline and mineral rights.

After all, it was the cost of the pipeline rights which caused President Bush to have the US military invade Afghanistan in the first place.

Republican Senator John McCain has censured the 16-year presence of US military in Afghanistan, saying that Washington’s efforts to restore peace have failed and the goal has been to not lose rather than to win.

Now comes President Donald Trump. His policies for the Middle East are similar to those of the previous two administrations but on steroids. Trump has already escalated the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. When Trump sends his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to solve the seventy-year-old Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu cannot hide his happiness with the appointment. The Democrats and the media are too busy with election results, hacking, and the Russian probe to pay much attention to Middle East policy, with one exception – Israel.

Webmaster's Commentary:

However, this time, unlike the situation in Iraq, there is a 6,000 lb gorilla, snoozing on the Bosendorfer, regarding further American military misadventures in the Middle East; it goes by the name of Russia, and will, should Iran be attacked, to Iran's aid militarily.

IF, in fact, the US goes to war against Iran, to appease its Israeli handlers, look for the reinstitution of a draft, for both men and women; an horrific decline in the US economy; and the possibility that the US military may well not be able to emerge victorious from the conflict.

One of the most common applications for medical marijuana is pain, whether it's inflammation, headaches, neuropathic pain, muscle soreness, spinal injury, fibromyalgia, or cramps. Patients have seen varying degrees of success with cannabis in treating various pain-related ailments, depending on the type of pain, the intensity, and the individual's own physiology.

Anyone attempting to “rebuild” Afghanistan will have their work cut out. The success of China’s Belt and Road Initiative hinges on progress being made, however

Will the New Silk Roads, a.k.a. Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) ever manage to cross the Hindu Kush?

Temerity is the name of the game. Even though strategically located astride the Ancient Silk Road, and virtually contiguous to the US$50 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) – a key BRI node – Afghanistan is still mired in war.

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg today confirmed that the alliance has agreed at a ministerial-level meeting on a plan to escalate military involvement in Afghanistan. The exact details of this are yet to be worked out, and it’s not clear which countries will actually commit troops to the buildup.

That could involve a substantial amount of wrangling with the US, as America’s own planned escalation has yet to be announced, and Defense Secretary James Mattis is heavily pushing NATO on the merits of continuing the already 16-year-old war into the future.

The basic outline agreed to would see up to 10,000 troops, between US and NATO nations, sent to Afghanistan, and puts the assumed US figure somewhere between 3,000 and 5,000. President Trump has delegated the decision on troop levels to Mattis, but he has yet to announce a decision.

Webmaster's Commentary:

NATO Secretary General and US Sec-Def Mattis, a word, please.

One of the classic definitions of insanity is doing something precisely the same way, over and over, yet expecting a different outcome.

There is no military metric by which the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan can possibly considered a "success", unless you want to count the absolute explosion in the production of opium poppies a "success".

Gentlemen, it is completely illogical to "magically believe" that another surge is going to have any greater affect than the surges which have preceded it; and that is the absolute, utter fallacy of this plan.

So, what to do?!?

I would like to politely suggest that all US/NATO troops be evacuated as quickly as safely possible, then the US and NATO should be negotiating with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for the pipeline and mineral rights. After all, it was access to, and potential control, of oil which brought the US government into war against Afghanistan in the first place;

The battle for Raqqa is now being waged, and the diverse forces that have been helping to extinguish the self-proclaimed caliphate of the so-called Islamic State (ISIS) soon must face squarely what becomes of the portion of Syria that ISIS had controlled.

The CIA wasn’t just involved with the transportation of the drugs, however. The heroin was refined in a laboratory built at the CIA headquarters in Northern Laos. After about a decade of U.S. military intervention, SEA represented 70% of the world’s opium supplier. Unfortunately, many of the operatives became addicted to the heroin themselves. At the same time, SEA also became the main supplier of raw materials for the U.S. heroin industry. Though Air America apparently stopped operations in 1976, the CIA’s involvement in the opium and heroin industries continued in other parts of the world.

Since the U.S.-led NATO invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the production of opium in the country has increased by 40 times according to Russia’s Federal Drug Control Service, or FSKN, fueling organized crime and widespread death.

The head of the FSKN, Viktor Ivanov, explained the staggering trend at a March U.N. conference on drugs in Afghanistan. Opium growth in Afghanistan increased 18 percent from 131, 000 hectares to 154, 000, according to Ivanov’s estimates.

“Afghan heroin has killed more than one million people worldwide since the ‘Operation Enduring Freedom’ began and over a trillion dollars has been invested into transnational organized crime from drug sales,” said Ivanov according to Counter Current News.

Webmaster's Commentary:

"Accidental", this massive boom in opium poppy production in Afghanistan?!?

A dramatic drop in U.S.-funded opium eradication efforts in Afghanistan over the last few years is fueling a growing heroin addiction problem afflicting tens of thousands of women and some children in the war-ravaged country, reports the Washington Post (WaPo).

Webmaster's Commentary:

After watching History Channel's "America's War on Drugs", that documents high-level US officials involved in the CIA's drug trafficking, one wonders if Obama's cut back was intended to bolster the supply. See also WHAT OUR CHILDREN ARE DYING FOR IN AFGHANISTAN

Last week President Trump delegated to Secretary of Defense James Mattis the authority to determine how many more troops to deploy into Afghanistan. Mattis has reportedly settled on 4,000. He claims that this will help end the stalemate in that war. He is wrong. This deployment will have no impact on the outcome of the 16-year-old war in Afghanistan, but more importantly, continues a troubling trend in U.S. foreign policy: The military move has no ties to a strategic outcome.

Webmaster's Commentary:

MORE blood and money spent on Afghanistan?!?

PLEASE HEAVEN, NO!!

What the US and NATO leadership should be doing is bringing home all of their soldiers as quickly as safely possible, then negotiating with whatever government is left standing in Kabul over the oil pipeline and mineral rights.

Of course, that...would be logical.

The US government, under President Bush, invaded Afghanistan for the pipelines, because it collectively believed that the prices the Taliban were demanding were too high.

(*And if The Experts Would Kindly Explain How That DOES NOT Trace Back To Former Republican President George W Bush' Illegal Premptive Invasion Of The Nation Of Afghanistan , And How A Good Patriot Would Never Seek Indictments Against Members Of That Administration's War Crimes , And Their Elongigated After Effects , It Would Be Appreciated )

The United States has a pattern of pushing for regime change in sovereign nations, while ignoring the consequences. One major result from the list of countries the U.S. has invaded this century is that they make up the top of the “least peaceful” nations in the 2017 Global Peace Index.

The 2017 Global Peace Index is another reminder that the United States’ seemingly endless pattern of pushing for regime change in sovereign nations that have done nothing to the U.S. has indeed resulted in a significant amount of blowback—most of which will be misrepresented, if not ignored by the mainstream media.

Americans may stay on Afghan soil for a “long-haul” mission that could evolve into several decades of “generational struggle,” General David Petraeus, ex-commander of US troops in Afghanistan, admitted.
The current war in Afghanistan is unlikely to end in the foreseeable future, David Petraeus, who led the US military campaign there back in the 2000s, told PBS News Hour.

Though the retired General argued that “we went there for a reason and we stayed for a reason,” to defeat Al-Qaeda following the 9/11 attacks, he hinted that “a generational struggle” may unfold in the war-ravaged country.

“This is not something that is going to be won in a few years. We’re not going to take a hill, plant a flag, go home to a victory parade,” he said. “And we need to be there for the long haul, but in a way, that is, again, sustainable,” he added.

To back his remarkable statement, he cited other examples of US deployments in other parts of the world that have lasted decades.

Webmaster's Commentary:

General Petraeus, a word, please.

To compare the US military presence in South Korea with its presence in Afghanistan is disingenuous at best, and an outright lie at worst, because there is absolutely no way to compare the US government's military presence in both countries

Let us be very clear about the reasons the US military is still in Afghanistan.

What the US and NATO should be doing, at this point in this 16 year war which cannot, by any military metric, be considered a "victory", is to evacuate all their soldiers as quickly as safely possible, then negotiate with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for all of the above.

Thousands of American soldiers and civil servants have lost their lives in the War on Terror. Innocent citizens of many nations, including Americans killed on 9/11, have also paid the ultimate price. While the US government claims to stand against terror, this same government refuses to acknowledge its role in creating what has become a deadly international quagmire. Visas for al-Qaeda: CIA Handouts That Rocked the World sets the record straight by laying the blame on high-ranking US government officials.

The US is definitely going to be sending more ground troops to Afghanistan soon, but the exact number is yet to be determined, with the Pentagon today backing away from media reports yesterday that they’d settled on a figure of 4,000 more troops, saying no final decisions have been made yet on numbers.

That might suggest they’re leaning toward an even bigger number, with influential retired Gen. Jack Keane suggesting that the US needed to send up to 20,000 more ground troops if they wanted to win the war, saying he believed the 4,000 figure was not likely to change the direction of the war.

Defense Secretary James Mattis conceded in testimony to the Senate this week that the US is “not winning” in Afghanistan, and President Trump has since given him unilateral authority to decide on troop levels and strategy. Mattis was seen as leaning toward the high end of escalation proposals.

Webmaster's Commentary:

The US military is Afghanistan for the pipeline routes, with which to checkmate Russia; the embarrassment of riches provided by its mineral wealth; and the opium poppy trade.

IF NATO, or US leadership were smart, they would leave Afghanistan as quickly as safely possible, and negotiate with whatever government remained standing in Kabul for all of the above.

Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis is reportedly set to announce an increase of about 4,000 US troops in Afghanistan. Most of the US boots on the ground will train or advise Afghan forces, but some will battle both a resurgent Taliban and Islamic State.

The U.S. has a problem with the former Marine General Mattis as Secretary of Defense. Mattis thinks tactics, not strategy.

It makes little sense to send additional troops when one does not what strategy they will have to serve. There is so far no other way to end the war in Afghanistan other than to simply pull out of it. The racket that the war has become can only be stopped by such a grand strategic decision. Sending troops before deciding on the strategy practically guarantees that the choice of a pull-out will be excluded from the evaluated possibilities. The tactical decision of sending more troops will drive the strategy.

Webmaster's Commentary:

I am very deeply concerned that the goal of the Deep State in the Unhinged, Surveilled States of America,is actually getting into
wars against China and Russia, to check the rise of the Yuan and Ruble in the international monetary world.

The problem is, at this point in its history, the US military does not have the money; the troop strength; the weaponry; or the manufacturing to effect a positive outcome with a conventional war against Russia and/or China.

The culture of American weapons manufacturers gives the heads of these corporations the luxury of believing that weapons and planes delivered so late, as to be obsolete, when delivered, is perfectly fine, coupled with mass cost overruns.

As a Christian pacifist activist, I abhor war as a way to resolve geopolitical differences, and always advocate for clean, clear, hard-won negotiations. That being said, if America is to be successful at war, this has got to change.

The Russian and Chinese governments are spending far less on their weapons and related systems than does the USSA, but definitely getting infinitely more bang for their weapons buck.

And what do Americans get for their tax dollar?!? I give you Lockheed Martin's F-35.

The US Military,poorly trained,poorly disciplined. When they get into a fight with a modern military they will have their heads and butts handed to them. Allowing themselves to be enveloped and flanked in Syria shows how unprofessional they are. As does this incident.

The relatives of an Afghan father and two of his sons, who they say were killed and disfigured by heavy US fire in the country's Nangarhar province, told RT they demand the American troops be punished. The US military says it's unaware of civilian casualties.

Zir Gul and his sons were basically torn apart by the US gunfire, with his uncle Ghulam Ahmad saying: It was horrible what the Americans did to them. Even I couldn't recognize their bodies.The tragedy left 12 of Zir Gul's children, six sons and as many daughters, without their provider.

The kids who are now facing a struggle for survival, are both shocked by their father's death and full of anger.

Sixteen years ago the U.S, invaded the country and decided to eliminate the ruling Taliban for something that was planed elsewhere by a different group. Since the invasion the U.S. tried to defeat the Taliban. It has lost that fight. As soon as it leaves Afghanistan the Taliban will be back in power. But no one is willing to pull the plug on the nonsensical military approach.

Sixteen years ago the U.S, invaded the country and decided to eliminate the ruling Taliban for something that was planed elsewhere by a different group. Since the invasion the U.S. tried to defeat the Taliban. It has lost that fight. As soon as it leaves Afghanistan the Taliban will be back in power. But no one is willing to pull the plug on the nonsensical military approach.

Yesterday the Secretary of Defense Mattis was asked during a Congress hearing what "winning" in Afghanistan would mean:

The idea, [Mattis] said, would be to drive down the violence to a level that could be managed by Afghan government forces with the help of American and allied troops in training their Afghan counterparts, providing intelligence and delivering what Mr. Mattis called “high-end capability,” an apparent allusion to air power and possibly Special Operations forces.
The result, he said, would be an “era of frequent skirmishing,” but not a situation in which the Afghan government no longer faced a mortal threat.
Winning in Afghanistan is an "era of frequent skirmishes" in which the proxy government is continuously endangered? That does, of course, not make any sense. It is a holding strategy that will only work as long as the general framework stays the same. Should the Taliban change their strategy or a new actor come in the "holding" strategy will be finished.

Webmaster's Commentary:

What the US and NATO should have done a long time ago, in this horrifically unwinnable war, is to have their troops leave as quickly as it is safe for them to do so, then negotiating with whatever government was left standing in Kabul over the pipeline and mineral rights.

Defense Secretary James Mattis was grilled before the Senate yesterday, with Sen. McCain expressing his frustration that there is no new strategy yet to "win" in Afghanistan. Mattis promised a new approach by July, but the real question is that after the 2009 surge of 100,000 US troops, what kind of victory might be achieved by yet another surge, this time of perhaps 5-6,000? In today's Liberty Report we point out that victory is not possible because Washington doesn't even have a clear view of what it might look like. How many more billions of dollars wasted? How many thousands more lives lost?

For quite some time, professor Iman Soleh and I discussed the link between the ‘old guard’ Southeast Asian (mainly Indonesians and Malaysians) jihadi cadres, so-called ‘Afghan alumni’, and the vanguard, a ‘new wave’, that which is now trying to destabilize, even destroy both Syria and the Philippines.

While the name ‘jihad’ itself has been used habitually and ‘liberally’ all over the Western mainstream media, it was clear to all of us at the table that behind the brutal combat as well as most of the horrors unleashed in such places like Syria and Philippines, hidden are the geopolitical interests of the West in general and of the United States in particular.

Professor Soleh has explained the latest ‘dynamics’:

Webmaster's Commentary:

You have to take a look at the "big picture", to see how the use of radical religious jihadis has been central to the US government's attempts at destabilisation around the world, to regime change governments to its liking, and make certain that the resources of those countries are only sold in American dollars.

When activists like me return from visiting the Afghan Peace Volunteers in Kabul, Afghanistan, young seamstresses there often entrust each of us with about fifty sky-blue scarves. The word “Borderfree” is carefully embroidered, in English, on one end of each scarf; on the opposite side, they’ve stitched the translation in Dari, the language they speak.

Defense Minister, General of the Army, Sergei Shoigu, speaking at a meeting of Defense Ministers - members of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in Kazakhstan, spoke of the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan and expressed the view that the international coalition in the country has not brought any tranquility.

He noted that the Islamic State operates in Afghanistan - a state which has observer status in the SCO.

"Of particular concern is the strengthening of Afghan militants positions, the number of which reaches around 3.5 thousand. Establishing an Islamic caliphate threatens the security of all; Afghanistan and neighboring countries."

In this regard, Shoigu said Russia will strengthen its military bases in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan with the latest weapons, as well as assisting the armed forces of Central Asian states in their defense measures.

The Islamic State (ISIS) was originally an Al Qaeda affiliated entity created by US intelligence with the support of Britain's MI6, Israel's Mossad, Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Saudi Arabia's General Intelligence Presidency (GIP).

The origins of Al Qaeda date back to the Soviet-Afghan war. The Koranic schools in Afghanistan used to train Al Qaeda recruits were financed by the CIA, using textbooks published by the University of Nebraska. That's where the evil ideology of Islamist extremism referred to by PM May originated: The Global War on Terrorism is a lie, Islamic terrorism is a product of US foreign policy which claims to be spreading Western civilization.

Over the weekend, the New York Times reported that President Trump’s National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster will soon be proposing yet another troop increase in Afghanistan. According to the Times, “The White House shelved the deliberations over Afghanistan three weeks ago, after an initial Pentagon proposal to deploy up to 5,000 additional American troops ran into fierce resistance” from White House chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon and other advisers.

But McMaster, reports the Times, is “undeterred” and “plans to bring the debate back to the front burner this coming week,” according to an anonymous U.S. official.

Webmaster's Commentary:

Mr. Mc Master, a word, please.

I would, sir, like to politely suggest that doing the same thing, precisely the same way, repeatedly, yet expecting a different outcome, is a classical definition of insanity.

And 16 years on, what, sir, will make this surge "different" from all the "surges" which have preceded the surge your are suggesting?!?

The short answer, sir, is absoflippinglutely nothing.

The cost, in blood and money already spent on an unwinnable war, has already been far too high, but of course, that means nothing to you.
American military, killed and maimed for life are simply collateral damage in the bigger war for profits for the American war machine.

And of course, such a suggestion is sending financial orgasms down the spines of all your buddies in the military/industrial complex, who will profit brilliantly from such a US military move.

President Trump, please; you need to realise that those who do not understand history are doomed to repeat it.

And pop quiz, Mr. President; who was the last person to successfully conquer, and hold Afghanistan, even for a little while?!?

You might remember this guy from history; his name was Alexander the Great, and even he...was only able to hang on to this hunk of the world for 3 years, through a series of marriages and alliances.

Mr. President, Afghanistan is not called "the graveyard of empires" for no good reason.

What should happen here is the most rapid removal of US and NATO troops out of the country as is safely possible, then have intense negotiations with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for the pipeline rights, and rights to the abundance of mineral riches it possesses.

After all, it was the squabble between Bush and the Taliban which really lead to Afghanistan's invasion in 2001:

"US Plans Invasion of Afghanistan July 21, 2001: US officials (Simons, Inderfurth and Coldren) meet with Pakistani and Russian intelligence officers in Berlin. [Salon, 8/16/02] Taliban representatives boycotted this meeting due to worsening tensions. Pakistani ISI relays information to the Taliban. [Guardian, 9/22/01] At the meeting, former US State Department official Lee Coldren passes on a message from Bush officials. He later says, "I think there was some discussion of the fact that the United States was so disgusted with the Taliban that they might be considering some military action." [Guardian, 9/26/01]

Accounts vary, but former Pakistani Foreign Secretary Niaz Naik later says he is told by senior American officials at the meeting that military action to overthrow the Taliban in Afghanistan is planned to "take place before the snows started falling in Afghanistan, by the middle of October 2001 at the latest." The goal is to kill or capture both bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Omar, topple the Taliban regime and install a transitional government of moderate Afghans in its place. Uzbekistan and Russia would also participate. Naik also says "it was doubtful that Washington would drop its plan even if bin Laden were to be surrendered immediately by the Taliban." [BBC, 9/18/01]

US Threatens Afghanistan with Carpet Bombs One specific threat made at this meeting is that the Taliban can choose between "carpets of bombs" - an invasion - or "carpets of gold" - the pipeline. [Bin Laden: The Forbidden Truth, Guillaume Dasquié and Jean-Charles Brisard, released 11/11/01]

Niaz Naik says Tom Simons made the "carpets" statement. [Salon, 8/16/02] According to the Washington Post, the Special Envoy of Mullah Omar, Rahmatullah Hashami, came to Washington bearing a gift carpet for President Bush from the one-eyed Taliban leader.

Taliban Offers Osama, US Refuses The Taliban offered the Bush administration to hold on to bin Laden long enough for the United States to capture or kill him but, inexplicably, the administration refused. [Village Voice}

That last statement was not "inexplicable"; Bin Laden was a US covert operative, and the Bin Laden and Bush families had been business partners with a string of ventures, both successful, and unsuccessful.

Over the weekend, the New York Times reported that President Trump’s National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster will soon be proposing yet another troop increase in Afghanistan. According to the Times, “The White House shelved the deliberations over Afghanistan three weeks ago, after an initial Pentagon proposal to deploy up to 5,000 additional American troops ran into fierce resistance” from White House chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon and other advisers.

Displaying what one commentator called “sheer 19th century bloodlust and thirst for empire,” Erik Prince, founder of the private mercenary firm Blackwater, argued in The Wall Street Journal this week that the United States should deploy an “East India Company approach” in Afghanistan.

The country, he wrote, should be run by “an American viceroy who would lead all U.S. government and coalition efforts - including command, budget, policy, promotion, and contracting - and report directly to the president.”

Prince continued:

In Afghanistan, the viceroy approach would reduce rampant fraud by focusing spending on initiatives that further the central strategy, rather than handing cash to every outstretched hand from a U.S. system bereft of institutional memory.

June 2, 2017 ~ ...Brzezinsky understood how easy it was for mistakes to launch a nuclear holocaust. He wanted to end the Cold War for the same reason that Ronald Reagan wanted to end the Cold War. To make Brzezinsky and Reagan the villians, as the left-wing does, when the real villians are the Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama regimes that have convinced Russia that Washington is preparing a nuclear first strike on Russia, is a form of ideological idiocy.

But idiocy in the West is what we live with. The question is: how much longer can we survive our idiocy?

During the election campaign of 2008 before he was elected as the president, Barack Obama made an artificial distinction between the “just war” in Afghanistan and the unjust war in Iraq. In accordance with the flawed distinction, he pledged that he would withdraw American troops stationed in Iraq.

More to the point, however, when President Obama decided to withdraw American troops from the unjust war in Iraq, at the same time, he pledged that he would commit additional American troops and resources into the purportedly “just war” in Afghanistan. And consequently, the number of US troops in Afghanistan jumped from 30,000 during the Bush Administration to more than 100,000 during the supposedly “pacifist” Obama Administration.

Webmaster's Commentary:

One of the classic definitions of insanity, is doing the same thing, precisely the same way, yet expecting a different outcome.

This is precisely where we are with the US government's policy toward Afghanistan in 2017; doing the same thing, precisely the same way, yet expecting a different outcome.

the US policy in Afghanistan has been an utter, epic fail; there is absolutely no military metric by which this 16 year, brutal stalemate of a war, can be adjudged as a "success."

And also, the alphabet soup agencies who are profiting greatly from the overwhelming growth of the opium poppy business, are very much in favor of the war continuing, because they use the opium poppy profits for "off the shelf" operations over which Congress has absolutely no supervision:

Everything I used to believe this country stood for, peace, honor, individual and collective responsibility, human rights,and human decency, has been absolutely turned upside down by this insane war, not to mention the credibility of the US government which, through my eyes, has absolutely none, and does not speak to the real needs and concerns of We the People.

It's all about the money, just as it was with Iraq, and its oil pipelines, which are now under a government which is nominally Western-centric, and its oil is only sold in US dollars.

President Trump (and those reading this site on his administration's behalf), a word, please. There are significant, fact-based reasons why this country is called "the graveyard of empires."

The British found this out, with much blood and money spent; so did Soviet Russia.

The uncomfortable, inescapable truth here is, that those who cannot learn from history, are doomed to repeat it. This is the conclusion to which the US government and NATO must ultimately come; I simply hope and pray, as a Christian pacifist activist, that such a conclusion will come sooner, rather than later.

So what should the US government and NATO do at this point in Afghanistan?!?

Remove US and NATO troops as quickly as is safely possible, declare "victory", and negotiate with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for the oil pipeline and mineral rights.

Let's call a spade a spade here; it was the failed negotiation between the Bush administration and the Taliban over the oil pipeline routes which got the Us government into this mess in the first place.

Atef’s memo shines new light on what al-Qaida knew about U.S. efforts to normalize relations with the Taliban in exchange for the fundamentalist government’s supporting the construction of an oil and gas pipeline across Afghanistan.

This was the real reason the US military went into Afghanistan; it was not because the Taliban "wouldn't give up Ben Laden" ; Ben Laden died of natural causes in December of 2001:

A policeman killed six other police servicemen in Afghanistan's southern province of Zabul and joined Taliban movement (terrorist organization, banned in Russia), local media reported Sunday citing local officials.

Today a news conference was held by co-sponsors of HR1666, to prohibit funds for activities in Afghanistan, and the importance of debating the 16-year war in Afghanistan, the longest war in America’s history.

As the Trump administration contemplates sending additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan, a bipartisan group in Congress has demanded a floor debate on the war's endgame and whether it remains in America's interest to remain engaged there militarily.

After months of top US generals insinuating, and sometimes flat out alleging, that Russia is “arming the Taliban,” the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) has finally stepped forward and admitted to the Senate that there “is no physical evidence” to back up such a claim.

Since Russia has been on bad terms with the Taliban for decades, the allegations never made any sense, but began being pushed by US officials with NATO ties roughly around that Russia offered to help broker peace talks, apparently based wholly on them having invited the Taliban to the talks.

The DIA’s comments appear to support this being the reason, saying they had “some indications” Russia had offered something to he Taliban, but that there was no evidence it ever amounted to anything, let alone weapons or money.

Webmaster's Commentary:

Dear DIA, a word, please; in this age of instant information, you can no longer lie to the American people, and the world, with impunity.

Please remember this the next time you are even, collectively, contemplating offering up more codswallop in the future; it just will not work anymore.

The "Big Lie" went out with the Whoopee Cushion and the dribble glass, decades ago, and there is utterly no way to resurrect it.

Graham Peebles stresses the misery driving people to migrate, and the miserable conditions they endure en route to and after arriving at their destination, and calls for compassion in treating these victims of circumstance.>>

With mainstream media still focused squarely on Trump’s alleged connections with Russia, a recent U.S. military strike in Syria and a plan to over 50,000 ground troops to Afghanistan have gone nearly unnoticed.

Even the waves of so-called “terrorists attacks” in Germany, Holland and France last year underscores that these are the conspiracy theories aimed at continuous war in Syria and elsewhere. Many Europeans would still keep faith with the war-mongers’ cooked-up stories and back the US and NATO’s intervention in Syria. The sole purpose of all these planned attacks was and is to demonize the Islamic State or Al-Qaeda and draw a whole support to wage a filthy war against “the nations” where these terrorists operate.

Unrest in Afghanistan is a recipe for more US weapons’ sales to war-exposed countries, viable drug trafficking that generates a profit far beyond measure, unearthing of underground resources worth of several trillion dollars, restraining of the regional military and economic rival powers and so others.

Webmaster's Commentary:

The sickening rhythm of "invade; regime change; occupy; expropriate resources; and insure those resources are only sold in US dollars" continues, unabated.

And in his weekend trip to Saudi Arabia, with that ginormous US arms deal he greenlit, it appears that President Trump is setting up that country for a proxy war against Iran, to regime change that country as well.

But there is one minor problem; in both Syria, and Iran, Russia's leadership has pledged both countries to resist any attempt at regime change; and the Russian military is very formidable, at this point in its history.

War with Russia over Syria and Iran?!?

That's precisely where the US government and military are headed right now, and unless there are some American leaders willing to bring some semblance of sanity back to DC, it is not a question of if, but when, such wars will happen.

In his March 10 article for the Washington Post, Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the US at the time of Osama Bin Laden’s execution in May 2011, has confessed to the role played by the Zardari Administration in facilitating the killing of Bin Laden. Husain Haqqani identified then-president Asif Ali Zardari as his “civilian leader” and revealed in the article: “In November 2011, I was forced to resign as ambassador after Pakistan’s military-intelligence apparatus gained the upper hand in the country’s perennial power struggle. Among the security establishment’s grievances against me was the charge that I had facilitated the presence of large numbers of CIA operatives who helped track down bin Laden without the knowledge of Pakistan’s army, even though I had acted under the authorization of Pakistan’s elected civilian leaders.”

The United States is pouring money into a corrupt sewer. The World Justice Project’s 2016 Rule of Law Index ranked Afghanistan 111 of 113 countries assessed. Despite U.S. arms, aid and training, its divided and demoralized security forces can’t stand up to the Taliban.

We are asking our military to build a nation on the other side of the world, dispatching soldiers who don’t know the language, the culture, the religion, the ethnic and sectarian divisions or the history. The one thing that may unify Afghanistan’s tribes is their pride in their independence. Afghanistan is known as the “graveyard of empires.” Its people routed the British forces repeatedly from 1839 to 1919 when Britain ruled the world. Its mujahideen defeated the Soviet Union’s invasion in the 1980s. The United States, with the most powerful military in the world, may avoid defeat for as long as it wants to waste lives and resources, but it will not win.

Webmaster's Commentary:

President Trump, a word please; doing the same thing precisely the same way, over and over, yet expecting a different outcome, is one of the most classic definitions of insanity.

Please declare victory and leave, getting our and NATO's troops out of the country as quickly as safely possible.

Then, negotiate with whatever government is left standing for the pipeline and mineral rights.

While publicly US strategy in the Afghan War has been based around the conceit that the conflict is in a “stalemate,” despite mounting losses by the Afghan government. Advisers have offered a classified assessment on the conflict recently, however, conceding that the Ghani government’s survival is at risk, and that the war is being “slowly” lost.

Their solution, as with everyone else, is even bigger escalation, with reports from those familiar with the plan saying that the US needs “more than 50,000” ground troops in Afghanistan to ensure Ghani’s survival, with an eye toward eventually defeating the Taliban.

That’s a big escalation, and a much bigger one than has been suggested in previous reports, which initially presented the proposed escalation as 3,000 to 5,000, and most recently made it a choice between 3,000 or keeping troop levels flat. The Pentagon is evasive about troop levels in recent months, but around 8,400 troops are believed to presently be in Afghanistan.

Webmaster's Commentary:

Forgive me, but where the heck are these 50,000 troops supposed to come from, without the reinstitution of the draft, given the stretched-thin state of the American military?!?

There is utterly no military metric by which the US/NATO invasion and occupation of Afghanistan can possibly be characterised as a "success" (unless you want to brand the burgeoning opium poppy trade, which is funding off the shelf operations for various "alphabet soup agencies, over which Congress has utterly no oversight, a "success").

By the end of this month, Defense Secretary James Mattis and National Security Advisor HR McMaster will deliver to President Trump their plans for military escalations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. President Trump would be wise to rip the plans up and send his national security team back to the drawing board – or replace them.

The two top national security officials in the Trump administration – Secretary of Defense James Mattis and national security adviser HR McMaster – are trying to secure long-term US ground and air combat roles in the three long-running wars in the greater Middle East – Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria.

Proposals for each of the three countries are still being developed, and there is no consensus, even between Mattis and McMaster, on the details of the plans. They will be submitted to Trump separately, with the plan for Afghanistan coming sometime before a NATO summit in Brussels on 25 May.

But if this power play succeeds in one or more of the three, it could guarantee the extension of permanent US ground combat in the greater Middle East for many years to come – and would represent a culmination of the “generational war” first announced by the George W Bush administration.

Webmaster's Commentary:

IF, in fact, President Trump signs off on these policies, look for a reinstitution of the draft in this country, sooner, rather than later, and a draft which includes both our young women, as well as our young men.

And yes, the word "permanent" applies, in all three countries, as it appears that the US military presence will never be leaving here.

The only "wild card" in the bunch is Syria, because of the both the Russian presence here, and their very clear determination that Damascus will not be regime changed.

Ex-George W. Bush-era national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, one of the architects behind the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, has admitted that bringing democracy to the Middle Eastern country was not the real priority. Speaking to Sputnik, Norwegian political scientist Georg Jakobsen said that the US's real goal was to impose its own model on Iraq.

Speaking at a meeting at the Brookings Institution, a leading DC think tank, on Thursday, Rice revealed that "security," not democracy, was the real motivating factor behind the US invasions of both Afghanistan and Iraq.

In Iraq's case, the former national security advisor (who also later served as Bush's secretary of state) revealed that the US "didn't go to Iraq to bring democracy to Iraq. We went to Iraq to overthrow Saddam Hussein, who we thought was reconstituting weapons of mass destruction, and who we knew had been a threat in the region. It was a security problem."

Webmaster's Commentary:

WOW, when this lady doubles down on disseminating bovine excrement, she really doubles down!!

Secretary Rice, a word, please; the world knows that you are lying, yet you continue to lie about the real motivations for both wars. You use the word "security" when what you meant was ECONOMIC security, because, as Karl Marx once noted, all wars are economic in their origins.

In Iraq, Saddam Hussein was selling their oil for other currencies than the US dollar; in Afghanistan, it was about securing the pipeline rights, and rights to the abundance of mineral riches in that country, and making sure that all that was only sold in US dollars.

It's that simple, and because the world knows you are lying about these issues, you will never be believed, in anything you say, even if what you say happens to be (accidentally) the truth.

US military officials and the State Department have recommended sending 3,000 to 5,000 additional troops, including hundreds of Special Operations forces, to Afghanistan, according to American media reports.

Advisers to US President Donald Trump have worked out and proposed a new plan that could significantly change the situation in Afghanistan expanding the military activities against militants, local media reported.

The Washington Post reported Monday that a group of Trump's military and foreign policy advisers had proposed a strategy aiming to push the Taliban terrorist movement, outlawed in Russia, to the negotiating table with the Afghan government.

According to the news outlet, the plan implies strengthening of the Pentagon's role in anti-Taliban struggle as it could be allowed to make decisions on the issues related to the number of troops in the country, as well as their presence at the battlefield and to attack the terrorists not only with the use of drones.

The program could result in reverse of the steps of ex-US President Barack Obama reducing the country's presence in Afghanistan along with the costs of the operation, the newspaper added.

The situation at the Afghanistan-Pakistan border is always tense, particularly after Friday’s exchange of fire between the two sides, but appears to be rapidly spiraling out of control, as Pakistani forces have attacked and destroyed several checkpoints along the Chaman border, which connects Balochistan to Kandahar.

At least 50 Afghan soldiers are reported dead, and over 100 wounded, as Pakistan reports they’ve destroyed five separate checkpoints in “retaliation” for Afghan fire. There was no news of new Pakistan casualties since Friday’s exchange of fire.

Locals say that the border crossing was closed earlier in the day by Pakistani security officials, and has remained so, with loudspeakers ordering all villages on the Pakistani side of the border evacuated until further notice. Helicopter gunships are reported overhead, and over 2,000 families have been displaced.

The latest in a series of Pentagon proposals on changing US policy in its assorted wars, a series of options are expected to be delivered to President Trump next week on Afghanistan. The options being presented, according to the Pentagon, are meant to “break the stalemate” in Afghanistan.

By “stalemate,” what the Pentagon really means is mounting losses, which have left the Taliban with more territory now than at any other point in the 16-year US occupation. The Pentagon has previously indicated the most ambitious escalation will involve some 5,000 more US troops and 13,000 NATO troops being deployed.

But either way, wars don’t get deescalated by the US these days, so all of the plans being offered are escalations, with the least of the deployments being 3,000 US troops and everything just going up from there. The details beyond that are not all public knowledge.

Webmaster's Commentary:

Mr. President, a word, please.

Even if you sign off on a major escalation in Afghanistan, including 5,000 US troops and 13,000 NATO troops 16 years on, when do these Pentagon staffers tell you that the war will actually be "won"?!?

Are the US government and NATO going to spend another 16 years, doing what they have done before, which has not worked, yet expecting a different outcome?!?

That, sir, is one of the classic definitions of insanity.

And because our US troops are spread so thinly right now, can you practically do this without reinstating the Draft?!?

There has been enough blood and money spent here, yet the ultimate geopolitical objectives have absolutely not been realized.

What the US and NATO should be doing is pulling their forces out of Afghanistan as quickly as is safely possible, then negotiating with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for the pipeline and mineral rights.

You are aware that it was the potential for obtaining these objectives which drove the Bush War Machine into Afghanistan, right?!?

News this week that 300 Marines have returned to Helmand Province in Afghanistan recalls the failed surge of 2009-10, when roughly 20,000 Marines beat back the Taliban in the region, only to see those “fragile” gains quickly turn to “reversible” ones (to cite the infamous terms of General David Petraeus, architect of that surge).

While fragility and reversibility characterize American progress, the Taliban continues to make real progress. According to today’s report at FP: Foreign Policy, “the Taliban controls or contests about 40 percent of the districts in the country, 16 years after the U.S. war there began.” Meanwhile, in January and February more than 800 Afghan troops were killed fighting the Taliban, notes Foreign Policy, citing a report by the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction. That’s a high figure given that fighting abates during the winter.

Webmaster's Commentary:

IF NATO High Command and the US government had two brain cells to rub together, (and the Afghani opium poppies weren't so damned profitable), the logical step here would be to leave Afghanistan as quickly as it was safe for US and NATO troops to do so, then negotiate with whatever government was left standing in Kabul for pipeline and mineral rights.

But, of course, THAT...would be logical; and there is no military metric whatsoever by which, 16 years on, either US nor NATO leadership can possibly "declare victory" in this insane war.

Matthew Hoh, a military veteran and diplomat who resigned his State Department post in protest of U.S. policy in Afghanistan, says the 16-year Afghan war won't end until the U.S. drops its strategy of sporadic escalation and insistence on Taliban surrender, with Afghan civilians suffering the worst consequences.

Almost 16 years after the U.S.-backed ouster of the Taliban, Afghanistan remains in the grip of a war with “shockingly high” death rates among security forces and a record number of casualties among civilians, according to the U.S. government watchdog monitoring the country’s reconstruction efforts. Civilian casualties rose to 11,418 last year, the highest since the United Nations began keeping records in 2009. In the first six weeks of this year, 807 Afghan soldiers were killed, John Sopko, the U.S. special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, said in a quarterly report to Congress issued late Sunday.

NATO is considering sending additional military personnel to Afghanistan and increasing the timeframe of the deployment in the view of the “challenging security situation,” the alliance’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, told the German Die Welt daily.

The additional troops are expected to join the NATO Resolute Support mission which it says is aimed at training, assisting and advising Afghan security forces in their fight against violent insurgents and various extremist groups.

The ‘training’ mission, after the majority of ‘combat’ troops were withdrawn, currently involves 13,000 servicemen, with around 8,400 of them being from the US.

Webmaster's Commentary:

Translation: the US and NATO are never leaving: the money from the opium poppies is just too great a financial boon to ignore, and now a seed from China can be grown nearly year round.

The April 13 strike by US forces in eastern Afghanistan saw the first deployment of the MOAB, the Mother of All Bombs, in a combat situation, dropped against ISIS forces in tunnels. The 22,000 lb pound was much vaunted for its huge size, the biggest non-nuclear weapon in the US arsenal, and presented as a “message” to other nations.

The reality, not so much. Locals report that the MOAB did way less damage than you’d think, noting that there were green trees still standing 100 meters from the center of the blast, with no sign of damage, and that the tunnels the ISIS fighters were within appear all but untouched.

The latest UN report on civilian deaths in Afghanistan showed a dramatic 54% increase in the number of women killed in the first quarter of 2017 over the same period in the previous year, alongside a 17% rise in the number of children killed. The deaths cover “conflict-related” fatalities.

Women and children are both are growing amount of the overall casualties of the Afghan War, and the UN expressed particular concern about the lack of effort to ensure protection for civilians among the various combatants, given that “fighting season” is fast approaching.

With little infrastructure,, Afghanistan’s war tends to quiet down somewhat during the winter, with a lot of areas of the country impassable. This tends to lead to a “spring offensive” which marks the official start of fighting season after the thaw, with casualties rising significantly nationwide.

Webmaster's Commentary:

The spring battles will most likely see an uptick in the deaths of women and children.

IF the NATO high command and the US government and military had a brain cell to rub together between them, they would bring their troops out of that accursed country as quickly as safely possible, then negotiate with whatever government was left standing in Kabul for the oil pipeline and mineral rights.

WASHINGTON D.C. — The United States had the ability to use aerial spraying to destroy the opium crops in Afghanistan used by the Taliban to fund their terrorist activities after 9/11 but refused to do so out of concern that the plants “might be too close to a mosque,” declared Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) during a congressional hearing.

We all know why they wont spray the poppies. Cuts into the CIA's profits!

Since the US invasion and occupation of Afghanistan in 2001, torture has been an ongoing problem, with both the occupation forces, and in particular the allied Afghan security forces, routinely abusing detainees captured in “conflict-related” circumstances.

The UN has issued a new report warning that the problem of torture among security forces is “as widespread as ever,” noting that at least 39 percent of detainees interviewed by the UN gave credible testimony of having been tortured by Afghan police, troops, or intelligence officials.

This is up from 35% reporting torture during the last UN report, in 2015. They also noted that despite repeated assurances by the Afghan government that torture won’t be tolerated, there is a near total lack of accountability for those torturing detainees in the country.

The Afghan War is going extremely poorly, 16 years in, and the US military needs someone to blame for its failures. The first choice among a lot of top military figures seems to be Russia, and while they offer no evidence to back up their claims, several have alleged that Russia might conceivably be arming the Taliban.

US commandeer Gen. John Nicholson appeared to be joining that camp today during comments in Kabul, complaining about the “malign influence” of Russia in the country, and insisting that he was “not refuting” allegations of Russia shipping weapons to the Taliban.

“Not refuting” is a very weak version of alleging, in this case, as US officials have offered no evidence that this is the case, nor any plausible reason why Russia would conceivably do this, as Russia fought materially the same insurgency during the 1970s and 1980s.

Webmaster's Commentary:

The reality here is that the war in Afghanistan was stupidly conceived, through a toxic combination of magical thinking, illogic, and a pathological inability to think a scenario through to its logical conclusion, and horribly executed, by the US and NATO, which still occupy the country today.

Blaming Russia for the US and NATO's failures in Afghanistan sound both like desperation on the cusp of madness, and a ramping up of the demonisation of Russia ahead of a potential attack against it, without any tangible evidence that these accusations are true.

What US and NATO leadership should do, from the most rational perspective, is to cut their losses; have all foreign troops leave Afghanistan, as quickly as it is safe to do so; then negotiate with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for pipeline rights, and access to Afghanistan's rich mineral deposits.

Armed police wearing bullet-proof vests dominated a so-called Town Hall Thursday evening called by Flint Mayor Karen Weaver to air the “feedback, questions and concerns” of residents after her announcement of a proposal for the 30-year future of the city’s water system. Many residents questioned the selection of venue, the House of Prayer Missionary Church, rather than a public space, given that this was supposed to be a forum for residents to air their grievances.

2001 was the official year U.S. forces began to invade Afghanistan with hostile force following the 9/11 attacks. President George W. Bush told Americans it was to defeat the Taliban and those terrorists who were threatening the United States. However, sixteen years later, the truth begins to emerge on what is at stake in Afghanistan and what there is to gain… dope, minerals, and power.

Afghanistan provides 90% of the world’s Opium, the raw material needed for the production of Heroin. It is basically the only way Afghanistan can keep their economy going. Without the Poppy fields, Afghanistan is finished.

An estimated 300 U.S. Marines are heading to a Taliban stronghold in the southern Afghanistan province of Helmand, one of the deadliest regions of the ongoing war for coalition forces located along the Pakistan border, reports Marine Corps Times.

The American troops are expected to reach their destination — where the Taliban has largely reversed previous U.S./NATO coalition gains — by the end of this month. Nearly all of Helmand has once again fallen under the control of the Taliban. Helmand sits next to Kandahar province, widely known as the birthplace of the Taliban.

Last week, the US deployed the MOAB “Mother of All Bombs” in Afghanistan for the first time ever, dropping it in a remote part of Afghanistan’s Nangarhar Province, supposedly against ISIS tunnels. Today, Pentagon officials confirmed that US ground troops are near the site of the bombing, still fighting ISIS forces.

The MOAB is the largest non-nuclear bomb ever deployed by the US, but what it actually accomplished is unclear, as the Pentagon has not confirmed any death tolls, and is keeping the site off-limits. That there are still ISIS fighters there to fight against, however, suggests that the MOAB was far from decisive.

Webmaster's Commentary:

So, we had... sound, fury, and destruction, signifying absolutely nothing, in terms of winning against ISIS.

Do you realise that a 16 year old kid in this country has never awakened to a day when the US military wasn't at war somewhere or other in the world, under the "excuse" of the alleged "war on terror"?!?

Except it's not a war on terror; it's a war for resources.

In Iraq, it was about making sure the country's oil was sold only in US dollars by a US- centric government.

In Afghanistan, where we have been at war going on 16 years, it was about oil pipeline routes, and the embarrassment of mineral riches this country possesses.

What a sane US government and NATO leadership would do would be to pull their troops out of the country as safely as humanly possible, and negotiate with whatever government was left standing for the pipeline rights and access to the minerals.

Of course, THAT...would be logical, and take away profits from the US's military/industrial complex.

With all the existing and potential wars the US government is itching to fight, and continues to fight, I see the re-institution of a draft in this country, and this time, it will be coming for not only our young men, but also our young women.

I don't know what the Vegas bookies' odds are on timing of the return of the draft, but I would think potentially, sooner, rather than later; perhaps within the next 12 months.

With the US seeking to slow the mounting losses by the Afghan military in the southern Helmand Province, the Pentagon has announced a deployment of roughly 300 US Marines to the province, with the fighters expected to arrive by the end of the month.

While the current Afghan government tries to defend the US use of the MOAB “Mother of All Bombs” last week against the Nangarhar Province, former President Hamid Karzai was extremely critical of the action, calling it an “immense atrocity” against fellow human beings.

Karzai complained that the current government was not offering enough comment when the US commits large strikes, saying the use of the largest non-nuclear bomb in history amounted both to a violation of Afghan sovereignty, and inherent disrespect to Afghanistan’s soil and environment.

The MOAB strike was dropped in the Achin District of Nangarhar, above what the US claimed was a substantial tunnel network used by ISIS. Though there is no sign of damage done to the tunnels, and MOAB is not intended to be a penetration bomb, President Trump has heralded it as a “successful event.”

Webmaster's Commentary:

Hamid Karzai is absolutely correct in his assessment here.

And I have to ask why the general who ordered this strike believed it was the right weapon to use at this time, and what the true objective really was.

US president Donald Trump sounded sincere when he described how he felt after seeing pictures of "beautiful little babies" allegedly killed by a Syrian government chemical weapons attack on April 4.

“These heinous actions by the Assad regime cannot be tolerated," said Trump, and hours later, the US launched nearly 60 tomahawk missiles in response to the allegations.

But what about the beautiful little babies killed by US bombs since Trump became president? Is Trump not concerned about those children because they were killed by his missiles, and not Assad’s chemical weapons?

In the first three months of his presidency, Trump has dropped bombs – and killed children – in Yemen, Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.

The reason why I decided to tackle this issue today is that the forces who broke Trump in less than a month are also the very same forces who have forced him into a political 180: the Neocons and the US deep state. However, I think that these two concepts can be fused into on I would call the “Ziocons”: basically Zionists plus some rabid Anglo imperialists à la Cheney or McCain. These are the folks who control the US corporate media, Hollywood, Congress, most of academia, etc. These are the folks who organized a ferocious assault on the “nationalist” or “patriotic” wing of Trump supporters and ousted Flynn and Bannon and these are the folks who basically staged a color revolution against Trump. There is some pretty good evidence that the person in charge of this quiet coup is Jared Kushner, a rabid Zionist. Maybe. Maybe not.

US National Security Advisor Gen. H.R McMaster arrived in Kabul on Sunday days after the American military dropped its largest non-nuclear bomb on Islamic State grouphideouts in eastern Afghanistan, killing nearly a hundred militants.
On his first visit to the country as President Donald Trump's envoy, McMaster said on Twitter he was set to hold "very important talks on mutual cooperation".

Earlier this week, President Trump ordered the dropping of a Massive Ordinance Air Blast (MOAB) on an Islamic State hideout in Afghanistan. The "Mother of All Bombs" allegedly killed at least 100 Islamic State jihadists. However, Wikileaks points out the cave complex that the bomb was dropped on was built by the CIA.

Washington failed to attend the latest international conference hosted by Moscow, where 11 nations discussed ways of bringing peace to Afghanistan. The US branded it a “unilateral Russian attempt to assert influence in the region.”

Despite US President Donald Trump hailed the first drop of "the Mother of all Bombs" in Afghanistan as "another success" of the American armed forces, military analysts doubt that the event will affect the course of the long-standing conflict in the country.

Afghanistan’s former President Hamid Karzai has blasted the US for dropping its largest non-nuclear bomb in the Asian country, saying Washington is using his country as a “testing ground” for its new weapons.

Vijay Prashad and Paul Jay ask if the US "mother of all bombs" dropped on Afghanistan and the missile attack on a Syrian airbase, are PR events to show Trump and the US military will "fight without restraint" and "take on Russia"

Webmaster's Commentary:

The machines will fight without restraint. The same will not be true for flesh-and-flood soldiers.

The U.S. generals demand, as they always do, more troops to "break the stalemate". But there is no stalemate. The Afghan farmers are winning. The Taliban control more areas now than they ever controlled since 2002.

Dropping 22,000 lbs of high explosives on some shack will not change that trend.

(Though it will drown the news that the U.S. military just bombed and killed 18 of its Kurdish proxy forces in Syria.)

Webmaster's Commentary:

Nearly 16 years on, there is no military metric by which the US/NATO invasion and occupation of Afghanistan can be characterised as a success.

What the US and NATO should do, is to withdraw all their troops as quickly as is safe, then negotiate with whatever government is left standing in Kabul for the oil pipeline and mineral rights.
Of course, such moves...would be logical.

President Donald Trump has hailed the US military's "very, very successful" strike on an Islamic State tunnel complex in Afghanistan with the largest non-nuclear bomb ever used in combat which killed 36 militants and destroyed their mountain hideouts near the Pakistan border.

A GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast Bomb, nicknamed MOAB, was dropped at 7 p.m. local time Thursday, the sources said. The MOAB is also known as the “mother of all bombs.” A MOAB is a 21,600-pound, GPS-guided munition that is America’s most powerful non-nuclear bomb.

The Pentagon is not fighting to win the war in Afghanistan, but not to have the perception the US lost the war, said Brian Becker from the ANSWER Coalition. Any troop surge in Afghanistan will not be decisive, he added.

Webmaster's Commentary:

The last military commander to totally conquer and hold Afghanistan was Alexander the Great ... and he only kept it three years.

Donald Trump has not started any new wars — yet. But his administration is pouring gasoline on several initiated by his predecessors. This week on Intercepted: There are U.S. boots on the ground in Syria — now including conventional military forces — and more are reportedly on the way. Trump has eased restrictions on the killing of civilians and is pummeling Yemen with drone strikes. Combined with the presence of radical ideologues in the White House and the involvement of the powerful militaries of Iran and Russia in the same battlespaces as the U.S., Trump could take the world to the brink of the unthinkable.

Exactly what the Satanic oligarchy, hoping to conceal their massive crimes against humanity want: a New World Order (Israel/bankers/China) from the irradiated ashes that destroys not only Russia, but the United states as well.

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) condemns in the strongest possible terms the horrific bombing of its hospital in Kunduz, which was full of staff and patients. MSF wishes to clarify that all parties to the conflict, including in Kabul and Washington, were clearly informed of the precise location (GPS Coordinates) of the MSF facilities in Kunduz, including the hospital, guesthouse, office and an outreach stabilization unit in Chardara northwest of Kunduz.

As it does in all conflict contexts, MSF communicated the precise locations of its facilities to all parties on multiple occasions over the past months, including most recently on September 29.

The bombing in Kunduz continued for more than 30 minutes after American and Afghan military officials in Kabul and Washington were first informed by MSF that its hospital was struck.

Yesterday afternoon, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power marched to Twitter to proclaim: “We call on Russia to immediately cease attacks on Syrian oppo[sition and] civilians.” Along with that decree, she posted a statement from the U.S. and several of its closest authoritarian allies — including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the U.K. — warning Russia that civilian casualties “will only fuel more extremism and radicalization.”

Early this morning, in the Afghan city of Kunduz, the U.S. dropped bombs on a hospital run by Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)). The airstrike killed at least nine of the hospital’s medical staff, and seriously injured dozens of patients. “Among the dead was the Afghan head of the hospital, Abdul Sattar,” reported the New York Times.

Jason Cone, MSF’s executive director, said the medical charity “condemns in the strongest possible terms the horrific bombing of its hospital in Kunduz full of staff and patients.”